Western Conference Semis - Uncle Joey vs. Charlie Conway

Part two of my Western Conference previews, features two teams that we're prominently featured in my childhood. I watched Full House just about everyday after school, and if you're in your early 20s and say you didn't you're lying. Uncle Joey, while living in the garage of the Tanner residence had a mannequin wearing a Red Wings jersey, and I thought that was awesome. And I still watch Mighty Ducks 1,2 & 3 a little more often than I would like to admit.

Call AAA, because here's the breakdown-


It was the thing to do earlier this week to jump on the San Jose Sharks for being the Number 1 seed losing the the 8-seed Anaheim Ducks and being outed in the first round, but it wasn't the sharks choking as much as it was the Ducks coming hotter than Marissa Miller. The Ducks were a much better team than your typical 8-seed would be. They basically drifted through the first 69 games of the year, and then needed a 10-2-1 record to finish the year just to barely make it into the playoffs. Had the Sharks faced a St. Louis or Columbus team, both of which were swept in the first round, they would most certainly be in the second round.

But they're not, and the Ducks are.



The Red Wings are just a good organization, plain and simple. They know what to do, and how to do it and you can't blame them for that. They are the reigning Stanley Cup champs and they have all the tools necessary to win the cup again...well almost. I'm not sold on Osgood. Never have been, but he just always does it. But this post season and last post seasons run are much different.

Detroit usually seems to split time in goal, mainly because they don't have a dominant goaltender that can start 55-60 games a year and play solidly. 07-08 saw Osgood split time with Dominik Hasek, and it saw him excel in this role. He posted a 2.09 GAA and a .914 SV%. He came into the playoffs as the backup, even though he had better numbers than Hasek, but was put in when the 1 seeded Wings lost their opening game to the Nashville Predators.

Similar story this year, but different results. This year he split time with Ty Conklin and started 44 games, but he saw his Goals Against rise a pull point higher to 3.09 and his SV% slip to a paltry .887%. Even though his numbers are much worse but he still managed to win 26 games, close to his 27 of 07-08. So how does this happen? Detroit is just damn good.



These are about as two evenly matched teams as you can get.

Both have the gunners up front.
Perry, Getzlaf, Selanne, Ryan for Anaheim.
Zetterberg, Datsyuk, Holmstrom, Hossa for Detroit.

Both are deep on defense.
Anaheim - Scott and Rob Niedermeyer, Pronger, Whitney
Detroit - Lidstrom, Rafalski, Kronwall, Stuart

And both have goaltenders that are on fire in these playoffs.
Anahiem - Jonas Hiller 1.65 GAA .957 SV% and 2 shutouts against the Sharks
Detroit - Chris Osgood 1.75 GAA .936 SV% and 1 shutout against the Blue Jackets.




What it's going to come down to is if Anaheim can keep it up. They've been playing outstanding hockey for the better part of a month and a half and you would think they would be just about out of gas, but this is playoff hockey, they'll find a way, but...

This series is going to come down to the wire. Wings in 7. Uncle Joey takes down Charlie Conway.

Western Conference Semis - 'Nucks vs. Hawks

Tonight the 2nd round of the nhl playoffs gets underway with the start of the Vancouver Canucks vs. the Chicago Blackhawks. I expect this to be the better of the two match-ups (Ducks - Wings preview coming later) in the west this round, then again, I also thought that the Blues would put up a better fight against the 'Nucks, but we all know how that went down.


One of the major things that stand out to me in this match, is how both teams enter it. The Canucks easily swept through the first round without much of a problem. Chicago had to battle back and forth against the Flames in a series that went 6 games.

This is going to be a major telling point. Chicago is a group of young inexperienced group of kids- Toews, Kane, Sharp, Versteeg, and more- and they are fired up. They played more of a series to advance and they also haven't had the kind of layoff that Vancouver did. I think they might be able to steal game 1 in Vancouver, catching them half asleep. If the Hawks can bring a 1-1 split in the series back to a reinvigorated Chicago crowd, this series will be that much more tough for the Canucks.


But what I think this series is going to come down to, much like many other playoff series, is experience and goaltending, and I have to give the advantage of both to Vancouver.

The Brother's Sedin have been here before, and with the addition of Mats Sundin at the deadline in February that only adds to their veteran depth. Even with how great Toews and Kane may be, and they'll get their turn in the near, very near, future, I think they may get caught up in the awe of it all.

There is little doubt as to whom is the best goaltender in this series is. Roberto Luongo can be the best goaltender in the world on any given night, and he was just about unbeatable against the Blues (1.16 GAA and .962 SV%). Nikolai Khabibulin can do it, though. He carried the Tampa Bay Lightning to a cup in 2003-04...but that was also 5 years ago, and father time doesn't stop for anybody. He was solid in the regular season and again in the playoffs, but in a goaltenders duel, I'll take Luongo any day of the week.

In all, I see Vancouver taking this series in 6 and moving onto the Western Conference finals. They have the firepower to match up against the young gunners of the Hawks, but they have been here before, where Chicago has not.

The Debate that Really Doesn't have an Answer

Beginning this Saturday night, the Penguins of Pittsburgh will travel to the nations' capitol to take on the Washington Capitals. Most casual fans won't see this match-up of two bitter rivals that battled just about every year in the early 90s, they'll see it as Crosby v. Ovechkin, and who can blame them? That will be all the national media will spew out over the next few days. Normally, this debate would make me want to slam my head in a car door, but I'll delve into this tonight.


v.



Both are two of the best players in the world, there is no debating that. If you think either Ovechkin or Crosby sucks, you're a joke, and there is also no debating that. Both can take over a game when they need to and both have carried their team back to respectability and also back into they playoffs. So let's try to compare the two.

Scoring
The only year that Sidney Crosby has failed to score more than 100 points was 07-08, but he still managed 72 points in just 53 games due to a high ankle sprain. Had he played the full season, at his 1.35 points per game rate, he would have finished with 110 points that season. Over his career, he is averaging 1.36 points per game. He is not a goal scorer though. Never has he eclipsed the 40 goal mark in his 4 years of service. He came close in his first two years with 39 and 36, respectively. I never expect him to win goals race in the league, and that is probably not a goal of his either. Where his production comes is in the form of the assist. He averages about .91 assists per game (and would be at a solid 1 per game. And I only expect this to go up as Evgeni Malkin and Crosby's linemates improve.

Ovechkin is going to win the previously mentioned Richard trophy more often than he will lose it. He is a goal scoring machine, and as he said, "Russian machines do not break." A lot of people, including myself, thought he had a real chance to get past 70 goals this year and maybe even challenge 80. But a rough 2 goals in the first 11 games of his season quelled that thought a bit. He still managed to bury 56 goals this year. If you take out the first 11 games and two goals, and project what he did the rest of the season, you would get just about 64 goals, roughly the same as the year before (and also winning the art ross, but we'll just keep quiet about that)

ADVANTAGE - PUSH
You need goals to win the game, but you need assists to score the goals.




Defense
This one is a little dicey to weigh the options on. Crosby is more of a two way player than AO, that's just honesty. I've seen enough Caps games to see that rarely will AO dig in the corners like Crosby, and I've only seen him give a hard backcheck once (which he happened to save a goal on, but if he hadn't turned it over in the first place, there would be no need to hustle as hard as he did). I've seen AO give up on enough plays and abandon his position just to throw out the big hit, which is flashy but could cost his team. Crosby just does what he does, and gets dirty when he has to, which is good enough for me.

ADVANTAGE - CROSBY
Crosby just does what he does, and gets dirty when he has to, which is good enough for me.




Physicality
No need to even compare the two here. Ovechkin plays a much much more physical game than Crosby. He had a total of 243 hits in 2008-09 and for a player of his caliber and finesse...that's just plain awesome. He gets people riled up on the ice and gets them off their game he gets under people's skin and then scores on them and he can also throw that big hit that can get his team going again. Crosby is more concerned with completing the play than completing the hit, which is fine, but it won't win him this category.

ADVANTAGE - OVECHKIN




You can argue the leadership quality and that Crosby has the C and Ovie doesn't, but who cares? Both get their team going in their own ways. AO has the better nickname, Alexander the Great vs. Sid the Kid. Alexander the Great conquered shit. Sid the Kid? Just an awful name. There really is no way to say who is the better player here. Where one lacks, the other excels. So how to settle this debate....





That right there is Richard Kiel, better known as the monster dude in Happy Gilmore that broke Shooter Mcgavin's 9-iron and wearing this incredible shirt





That's Andy Samberg of SNL and The Lonely Island fame. While he may entertain and make me laugh at times, he never wore that shirt.

WINNER - OVECHKIN with an assist from Richard Kiel
Kiel comes in and takes out Sid and Samberg with a steel chair while Ovechkin distracts the ref. AO gets the three count and the narrow escape.

Breaking the Ice

So, it looks like all those people at ESPN are right; anyone really can start a blog.

First thing is first, a little about me.

1. I am a Pittsburgh sports fan. I was born and raised in the black and gold and I fully support my teams. That said, there is nothing more I hate than "homers". Honestly, they embarrass themselves. Support your teams, just be knowledgeable about what else is happening out there. One of my biggest irritants is when someone will only support their team and ignore everything else happening. You can not like another team. I hate the Philadelphia Flyers. I hate them with everything I have, but I know they're a great team, and I give credit where credit is due. No, Jeff Carter does not suck. No, Mike Richards does not suck. They're actually exceptional players. I don't like them, but would I like to have them on my team? Hell and yes.

2. Being that I am a Pittsburgh fan, and the colors of this site are black and gold, the majority of the material here will be about Pittsburgh sports. But, I am a sports fan in general. So I will post news and my opinions on many of the things happening in the sports world. It will most likely be seasonal (Fall is football/hockey/baseball. Winter - hockey. Spring - hockey/baseball). I don't know shit about basketball, so there won't be much of that. Unless something really, really cool happens, like Ron Artest beating up Pistons fans.

3. The biggest reason for starting this blog? It's summer, I ain't got no job, and I ain't got shit to do. Also, I'm majoring in writing and I have hopes of writing for the dying medium known as newspapers someday.

4. Thank you to those of you who are still with me, I look forward to adding my 2 cents into the sports world.

God, I hate the icebreakers